Plate-connection type heat exchanger

ABSTRACT

The present invention relates to a heat exchanger and, more specifically, to a plate-connection type heat exchanger, wherein the assembling and connection of plates used in a heat exchanger can be simplified so as to reduce the manufacturing time thereof and manufacturing process, thereby improving productivity and product quality.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION

This application claims priority of Korean Patent Application No.10-2014-0149363, filed on Oct. 30, 2014, in the KIPO (KoreanIntellectual Property Office), the disclosure of which is incorporatedherein entirely by reference.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

1. Field of the Invention

The present disclosure relates to a heat exchanger and, morespecifically, to a plate-connection type heat exchanger, wherein theassembling and connection of plates used in a heat exchanger can besimplified so as to reduce the manufacturing time thereof andmanufacturing process, thereby improving productivity and productquality.

2. Description of the Related Art

A plate-shaped heat exchanger used in a boiler employs plate generallyuses stacked plate chambers for the improvement of heat exchangeefficiency with respect to the combustion heat generated in a burnerpart.

As an example, there has been suggested a plate-shaped heat exchanger 1in Korean Reg. Utility Model Publication No. 20-0275401, wherein a topplate 10 having outlets and inlets for direct water and heating water ispositioned at an upper side and a plurality of first and second pathplates 20 and 30 are stacked in a mutually intersecting shape at thelower side of the top plates in such a manner that paths are formed soas to prevent the mixing of the fluids, which flow through the outletsand inlets for the direct water and the heating water, from each other,as shown in FIG. 1 and FIG. 2.

In other words, the positions of the paths, through which the fluidsflow, intersect each other in the vertical direction such that thefluids passing through the paths are not mixed with each other whilepassing through the paths but the fluids carry out the heat exchangeoperations with each other, wherein the surface contact areas betweenthe mutually intersecting paths are connected by brazing welding.

However, in the process of connecting the first and second path plates20 and 30, the brazing welding is carried out relatively weakly at thecorner parts rather than in the centers of the plates so that localpressure is generated due to the excessive water pressure by waterhammering and cracks are generated in the peripheries of the weldedparts.

That is, the plate chambers for the prior art heat exchanger asdescribed above have a wing structure, in which the first path plates 20and the second path plates 30 are aligned in a same direction, such thatthe wing surfaces of the path plates are overlapped to be connected.Therefore, the brazing welding is carried out for the connection byusing copper plates or after additionally applying a solvent inaccordance with circumstances.

However, according to the prior art plate chambers, if the brazing workis carried out in a state, where the wing surfaces of the first pathplate 20 and the second path plate 30 are overlapped or the solvent 2 isapplied to the top parts of the wing surfaces of the second path plates,as shown in FIG. 3, the surfaces to be applied with the solvent 2 aresmall, or the volume of the solvent 2 is expanded due to the thermaldeformation of the basic materials between the wing surfaces, or bubblesare generated above the melting temperature thereof. Therefore, eventhough a section having the bubbles can maintain the airtightness for ashort time, the section having the bubbles is likely to be eroded withspeed after a certain time. Consequently, the prior art has advantagesof water leakage, crack generation and the like in the welded parts.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

The present invention has been made to solve the above-mentionedproblems occurring in the prior arts, and it is an objective of thepresent invention to provide a plate-connection type heat exchanger, theedge wing parts of a top plate and a bottom plate, which form a platechamber of a heat exchanger, have different angles from each other suchthat the stacking and assembling of the top plate and the bottom platecan be simplified and the failure in the welding work can be improved.

It is another objective of the present invention to provide aplate-connection type heat exchanger, wherein the wing surface of thebottom plate and the wing surface of the top plate are elasticallyfitted with each other so as to be assembled with each other, therebysimplifying the applying of a solvent and improving the convenience inthe brazing welding work.

To accomplish the above objectives, according to one aspect of thepresent invention, there is provided, in a heat exchanger, whereinplates, each having a top plate and a bottom plate, are stacked, andwing parts of the top plate and the bottom plate are brazed to be joinedtogether such that a path is defined inside, a plate-connection typeheat exchanger, characterized in that the wing part of the top plate isfolded downwards, and the wing part of the bottom plate is formed with afitting surface to be fitted with the wing part of the top plate and abase surface folded in the outward direction from the fitting surface,such that the wing part of the top plate is fitted inside the fittingsurface and a solvent applying space H is formed between the basesurface and the wing part of the top plate.

The wing part of the top plate is formed to be folded downwards at anobtuse angle, and the fitting surface forming the wing part of thebottom plate is formed to be folded upwards.

According to another aspect of the present invention, there is provided,in a heat exchanger, wherein plates, each having a top plate and abottom plate, are stacked, and wing parts and of the top plate and thebottom plate are brazed to be joined together such that a path isdefined inside, a plate-connection type heat exchanger, characterized inthat the wing part of the top plate is folded downwards at an obtuseangle, and a fitting surface forming the wing part of the bottom plateis formed to folded upwards in a direction forming a right angle to anobtuse angle, such that the wing part of the top plate is fitted insidethe fitting surface and a solvent applying space H is formed between thefitting surface and the wing part of the top plate.

The wing part of the top plate is formed to be folded downwards at anobtuse angle, and the fitting surface forming the wing part of thebottom plate is formed to be folded upwards at an acute angle in aninward direction.

The wing part of the top plate is formed to be folded downwards at aright angle, and the fitting surface forming the wing part of the bottomplate is formed to be folded upwards at a right angle.

A plurality of embossing protrusions are formed to be protruded at apredetermined interval on the inside of the fitting surface of thebottom plate wing part, and a bending protrusion is formed on the frontend of the top plate wing part so as to be held by and fitted with theembossing protrusions.

According to the present invention as structures above, the assemblingof the top plate and the bottom plate of a plate member used in a heatexchanger can be conveniently and easily carried out, thereby improvingthe productivity.

Further, an area and a volume for a solvent to be applied to the wingparts of the top plate and the bottom plate can be uniformly formed,thereby preventing defective brazing welding. Even though a defective isgenerated, secondary solvent applying is enabled using the solventapplying space, thereby reducing a fraction defective.

Therefore, the assembling of the top plate and the bottom plate can beconveniently carried out and the solvent can be applied from the outsideafter the assembling such that the automated manufacturing of theplate-connection type heat exchanger can be realized, thereby noticeablyimproving the productivity.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The above and other features and advantages will become more apparent tothose of ordinary skill in the art by describing in detail exemplaryembodiments with reference to the attached drawings, in which:

FIG. 1 is a perspective view for illustrating the appearance of a priorart plate-shaped heat exchanger.

FIG. 2 is a cross-sectional view for illustrating the prior artplate-shaped heat exchanger.

FIG. 3 is an expanded cross-sectional view for illustrating the priorart plate-shaped heat exchanger.

FIG. 4A to FIG. 4C are expanded cross-sectional view for illustratingthe coupling process to which the present invention is applied.

FIG. 5A is a partially expanded cross-sectional view for illustrating anembodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 5B is an expanded cross-sectional view for illustrating anembodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 6A and FIG. 6B are expanded cross-sectional view for illustratinganother embodiment of the present invention.

In the following description, the same or similar elements are labeledwith the same or similar reference numbers.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

The present invention now will be described more fully hereinafter withreference to the accompanying drawings, in which embodiments of theinvention are shown. This invention may, however, be embodied in manydifferent forms and should not be construed as limited to theembodiments set forth herein. Rather, these embodiments are provided sothat this disclosure will be thorough and complete, and will fullyconvey the scope of the invention to those skilled in the art.

The terminology used herein is for the purpose of describing particularembodiments only and is not intended to be limiting of the invention. Asused herein, the singular forms “a”, “an” and “the” are intended toinclude the plural forms as well, unless the context clearly indicatesotherwise. It will be further understood that the terms “includes”,“comprises” and/or “comprising,” when used in this specification,specify the presence of stated features, integers, steps, operations,elements, and/or components, but do not preclude the presence oraddition of one or more other features, integers, steps, operations,elements, components, and/or groups thereof. In addition, a term such asa “unit”, a “module”, a “block” or like, when used in the specification,represents a unit that processes at least one function or operation, andthe unit or the like may be implemented by hardware or software or acombination of hardware and software.

Unless otherwise defined, all terms (including technical and scientificterms) used herein have the same meaning as commonly understood by oneof ordinary skill in the art to which this invention belongs. It will befurther understood that terms, such as those defined in commonly useddictionaries, should be interpreted as having a meaning that isconsistent with their meaning in the context of the relevant art andwill not be interpreted in an idealized or overly formal sense unlessexpressly so defined herein.

Preferred embodiments will now be described more fully hereinafter withreference to the accompanying drawings. However, they may be embodied indifferent forms and should not be construed as limited to theembodiments set forth herein. Rather, these embodiments are provided sothat this disclosure will be thorough and complete, and will fullyconvey the scope of the disclosure to those skilled in the art.

A plate-connection type heat exchanger according to the presentinvention can simplify the assembling and connection of plates used in aheat exchanger, thereby reducing the manufacturing time and themanufacturing process and thus improving the productivity and productquality.

First, referring to the accompanying drawings, a heat exchangeraccording to an embodiment of the present invention includes plates 50,each including a top plate 60 and a bottom plate 70, are stacked andthen the wing parts 61, 71 of the top plate 60 and the bottom plate 70are brazed to be jointed together such that a path is formed in theplate 50.

Herein, according to this embodiment of the present invention, in orderto more simply and readily connect the top plate 60 and the bottom plate70, which formed the plate 50, the shapes of the wing parts 61, 71 aredeformed and subject to brazing welding, thereby preventing a defective.

To this end, according to the present invention, the wing part 61 of thetop plate 60 is formed to be folded downwards at an obtuse angle, andthe wing part 71 of the bottom plate 70 is formed to have a fittingsurface 72 folded upwards at an acute angle in an inward direction and abase surface 73 folded in the outward direction from the fitting surface72, as shown in FIG. 4A.

Further, as shown in FIG. 4B, in a state, where the wing part 61 of thetop plate 60 is moved downwards so as to be held by the base surface 73of the bottom plate wing part 71 and elastically moved inside the basesurface 73 of the bottom plate wing part 71, if the top plate 60 isfurther moved downwards, then the top plate wing part 61 passing thebase surface 73 is restored such that the fitting surface 72 formed atan acute angle and the top plate wing part 61 formed at an obtuse anglecome into surface-contact with each other and are thus connectedtogether.

Accordingly, a solvent applying space H is formed between the top platewing part 61 and the base surface 73 of the bottom plate wing part 71,such that a worker can easily apply a solvent 2 to the solvent applyingspace H.

That is, the plate 50, which is thus integrally formed by the connectionbetween the wing part 61 of the top plate 60 and the wing part 71 of thebottom plate 70, has the solvent applying space H which is formed alongthe coupled edge part so as to be easily applied with the solvent 2 fromthe outside, thereby enabling automation.

Then, referring to FIG. 4C, in a state, where the solvent 2 is appliedto the solvent applying space H of the plate 50, the brazing welding iscarried out so as to complete the connection while the solvent 2prevents the oxidation of the adhesion surface.

Further, the present invention, if a defective is found in the leakagetest of the plate 50 after the brazing welding, the solvent 2 is appliedagain to the solvent applying space H and then the brazing welding iscarried out again. Therefore, it is possible to prevent the generationof defectives.

Further, according to another embodiment of the present invention, aplurality of embossing protrusions 72 a are formed at a predeterminedinterval along the edge of the fitting surface 72 of the bottom platewing part 71, and a bending protrusion 61 a is formed on the front endof the top plate wing part 61 so as to be held by and fitted with theembossing protrusions 72 a, as shown in FIG. 5A.

Therefore, as shown in FIG. 5B, if the wing part 61 of the top plate 60is coupled to the fitting surface 72 of the bottom plate wing part 71,the bending protrusion 61 at the front end of the wing part 61 is heldby the embossing protrusions 72 a so as to be fixed.

Herein, a gap is formed between the fitting surface 72 of the bottomplate wing part 71 and the top plate wing part 61 by the embossingprotrusions 72 a such that the solvent 2 to be applied to the solventapplying space H is introduced into the gap and the brazing welding iscarried out in this state, thereby maximizing the connection strength.

Furthermore, according to a further embodiment of the present invention,it is also possible to provide a plate 50, in which the wing part 61 ofthe top plate 60 is folded downwards at an obtuse angle while the wingpart 71 of the bottom plate 70 has a fitting surface folded upwards in aright angle direction and a base surface 73 folded in the outwarddirection from the fitting surface 72, such that the wing part 61 of thetop plate 60 is fitted inside the fitting surface 72, as shown in FIG.6A.

Therefore, the plate 50 as above has a predetermined gap formed betweenthe top plate wing part 61 and the fitting surface 72 of the bottomplate wing part 71, wherein, if the solvent 2 is applied to the solventapplying space H, the solvent is introduced into the gap and the brazingwelding is carried out, thereby maximizing the connection strength.

Further, as shown in FIG. 6B, it is also possible to form a plate 50, inwhich the top plate wing part 61 is folded downwards at an obtuse angleand the bottom plate wing part 71 has a fitting surface 72 foldedupwards at a right angle to an obtuse angle.

Therefore, the top plate wing part 61 is held inside the fitting surface72 of the bottom plate wing part 71, and the connection therebetween iscarried out by applying the solvent 2 to the solvent applying space Hbetween the top plate wing part 61 and the fitting surface 72 of thebottom plate wing part 71 and carrying out the brazing welding.

According to this embodiment, the wing part 61 of the top plate 60 issimply assembled into the wing part 71 of the bottom plate 70 and theapplying of the solvent 2 is readily carried out, such that the topplate 60 and the bottom plate 70 can be conveniently connected.

While all components constituting the embodiments of the presentdisclosure are described hereinabove as being coupled into one oroperating while coupled, the present disclosure is not necessarilylimited to such embodiments. That is, within the objective scope of thepresent disclosure, the components may operate in a selectively coupledmanner of at least one of them. Also, each of the components may beimplemented as a single independent hardware, but may be implemented asa computer program having a program module that is composed of aselective combination of some or all of the components and performs someor all of functions of the combinations in one or more hardware. Also,codes and code segments constituting the computer-readable code may beeasily inferred by one of ordinary skill in the art. Thecomputer-readable code is stored in a computer-readable medium and isread and executed by a computer system, to implement the exemplaryembodiments of the present disclosure. The recording medium of thecomputer-readable code may include a magnetic recording medium, anoptical recording medium, and the like.

While the present disclosure has been described with reference to theembodiments illustrated in the figures, the embodiments are merelyexamples, and it will be understood by those skilled in the art thatvarious changes in form and other embodiments equivalent thereto can beperformed. Therefore, the technical scope of the disclosure is definedby the technical idea of the appended claims The drawings and theforgoing description gave examples of the present invention. The scopeof the present invention, however, is by no means limited by thesespecific examples. Numerous variations, whether explicitly given in thespecification or not, such as differences in structure, dimension, anduse of material, are possible. The scope of the invention is at least asbroad as given by the following claims.

What is claimed is:
 1. A plate-connection type heat exchanger, in whichstacked plates, each plate having a top plate and a bottom plate, andwing parts of the top plate and the bottom plate are brazed to be joinedtogether such that a path is defined inside, characterized in that: thewing part of the top plate is folded downwards, and the wing part of thebottom plate is formed with a fitting surface to be fitted with the wingpart of the top plate and a base surface folded in the outward directionfrom the fitting surface, such that the wing part of the top plate isfitted inside the fitting surface and a solvent applying space is formedbetween the base surface and the wing part of the top plate.
 2. Theplate-connection type heat exchanger of claim 1, wherein the wing partof the top plate is formed to be folded downwards at an obtuse angle,and the fitting surface forming the wing part of the bottom plate isformed to be folded upwards.
 3. A plate-connection type heat exchanger,in which stacked plates, each plate having a top plate and a bottomplate, and wing parts of the top plate and the bottom plate are brazedto be joined together such that a path is defined inside, characterizedin that: the wing part of the top plate is folded downwards at an obtuseangle, and a fitting surface forming the wing part of the bottom plateis formed to be folded upwards in a direction forming a right angle toan obtuse angle, such that the wing part of the top plate is fittedinside the fitting surface and a solvent applying space is formedbetween the fitting surface and the wing part of the top plate.
 4. Theplate-connection type heat exchanger of claim 3, wherein the wing partof the top plate is formed to be folded downwards at an obtuse angle,and the fitting surface forming the wing part of the bottom plate isformed to be folded upwards at an acute angle in an inward direction. 5.The plate-connection type heat exchanger of claim 3, wherein the wingpart of the top plate is formed to be folded downwards at a right angle,and the fitting surface forming the wing part of the bottom plate isformed to be folded upwards at a right angle.
 6. The plate-connectiontype heat exchanger of claim 2, wherein a plurality of embossingprotrusions are formed to be protruded at a predetermined interval onthe inside of the fitting surface of the bottom plate wing part, and abending protrusion is formed on the front end of the top plate wing partso as to be held by and fitted with the embossing protrusions.
 7. Theplate-connection type heat exchanger of claim 4, wherein a plurality ofembossing protrusions are formed to be protruded at a predeterminedinterval on the inside of the fitting surface of the bottom plate wingpart, and a bending protrusion is formed on the front end of the topplate wing part so as to be held by and fitted with the embossingprotrusions.